Books like The Age of Dinosaurs — picked by fans

Honestly, I think I’ve read almost every book Mary Pope Osborne wrote.

When my son was little, he loved these books. One of the first chapter books he picked up at a local bookstore was Dinosaurs Before Dark. I love how her books are a cross between nonfiction and fiction. Her two main characters drew me (and my son) into the story. We read Dinosaurs Before Dark together. 

My son and I learned a lot about dinosaurs. We loved how the main characters travel in the Magic Treehouse. Dinosaurs Before Dark was the first book from this author. My son is grown up now, and we still remember reading most of her books. 

When I first read this book, it was a chapter book. I recently discovered the same book as a graphic novel. I love the illustrations. 

This is a book for all ages.

It’s a beautifully illustrated picture book about the life of Barnum Brown. He worked as a paleontologist for the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, and he discovered the first documented skeleton of the Tyrannosaurus Rex.

The book is nonfiction. It focuses on his life growing up, the T-rex skeleton, and his other dinosaur discoveries. His parents named him after P.T. Barnum, the famous circus icon. His story is delightful, and what makes it more appealing are the numerous dinosaur drawings included in the book. 

I, like many kids and adults, love dinosaurs. I also like reading lively stories that teach me about dinosaurs and science. The illustrations stand out, and the story is about a real person who did amazing things. While reading the book and afterwards, I became a fan of Barnum Brown. I had no idea who… show more.

I love art.

When I was a kid, I spent a lot of time at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. At the time, this was many years ago, I had no idea that the dinosaur skeletons I looked at were mostly man-made. I thought each dinosaur was 100 percent real dinosaur bones. I now know better. 

This book taught me what a paleoartist does. Paleoartists are illustrators who reconstruct dinosaurs and other ancient animals. They also create the settings where these animals lived. 

The book took me into the past and showed me how these magnificent creatures spent their time on Earth. The ten paleoartists in this book share stories and their art. It gave me a better understanding of the past. 

This book introduces children to an assortment of dinosaurs and the famous female paleontologists who discovered them. This is a book for K-2. It’s a great introduction to the world of paleontology. 

This is a book filled with easy-to-understand facts about dinosaurs, and I love G. Brian Karas’ illustrations. It provides readers with a good understanding of paleontology and may even spark some with an interest in becoming a paleontologist. 

This book is great for those who want a more exhaustive reference book. This is one of several good dictionaries of dinosaurs and related terms. It is illustrated in black and white, but the text predominates, and as such it serves as a reliable reference for facts about dinosaurs, including many that are not found in mass-produced gift books. I also like that it includes the etymology of entries. It’s a little old (1983), but was awarded several honors, including being a Golden Kite Honor Book, and ALA Notable Book, and a Boston Globe/Horn Book Honor Book.

This is the best textbook about dinosaurs.

If you want to have all the latest information about the diversity of dinosaurs, how their bones are found and excavated, their history through time, all the key groups, how they are related to each other, and what we know about their life and times, this is the book.

This is a tried and tested textbook, now in its fourth edition, but full of anecdotes, great text, and great illustrations, many of them by the maestro, John Sibbick.

From the lizard-looking Dimetrodon to the wooly mammoth to the 1,000-pound turtle-like Glyptodont, as well as the modern-day Latimeria fish species that was believed to have gone extinct millions of years ago (Surprise! It turned up in a fisherman’s net!), puts this book in the “must-read” category. A bouncy rhyming text that highlights large creatures that roamed the Earth both before and alongside dinosaurs, makes this book a win, especially since it lands at a modern-day avian dinosaur that can be seen in tweety parakeet.

Jenny Lu writes wonderful STEM children’s books.

In this story, Emma the main character, is learning about dinosaurs and fossils in school, so her class goes on a field trip to the Natural History Museum. When she learns she will be digging in the dirt to uncover fossils, she isn’t too happy, but she later discovers it can be fun.

A great educational book with facts about dinosaurs and fossils.

Like Wilford’s book, this one goes through the history of palaeontology, but puts it in the context of society at the time. For example the general appreciation of the dinosaur in the last 150 years has gone from an amazing curiosity, through a symbol of something that was too clumsy to survive, through a metaphor for our own vulnerability to climate change or pollution or nuclear annihilation, to the venerable ancestor of our lovely birds . . . It can be a bit nerdy at times – overly detailed plot lines of particular films or comic books – and can be somewhat repetitive – the same examples cropping up again and again. The sweep of the work references other writers in the field – including Septhen Jay Gould, Donald F. Glut and the above John Noble Wilford – giving a great coverage of the subject

We can be a bit precious about all this. But it is important to keep in mind that we have not always known as much as we do now about the history of life on earth. Wilford gives us a very readable account of the practical history of palaeontology - the people involved, the excitement of the discoveries, the anecdotes of the expeditions, the thought processes that went into the interpretations . . . And how the public have percieved the various discoveries throughout history.